


And He Wandered the World

by picklesaregood



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: F/M, Imprisonment, M/M, Most stuff is implied rather than explicitely stated, Romano is a soldier, Suggestions of PTSD, Suggestions of injury, War, suggestions of violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-06
Updated: 2016-02-10
Packaged: 2018-05-18 16:14:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5934772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/picklesaregood/pseuds/picklesaregood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>First come the refugees. Then comes war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

.

They come slowly at first, in groups of fours and fives, all with backpacks and donkeys and carts trailing behind them. With each new visitor, Lovino looks up. He leans on his hoe, wipes his brow, and rolls his eyes. They will not find hospitality here.

Papa calls them scum, Mamma calls them tramps, but Grandpa calls them refugees and say that they need help. And so, because the farm is truly Grandpa’s, once or twice a family comes to have dinner with them. Their dining room is cramped and the fire flickers oddly off the stone walls in ways that make strange shadows across the newcomer’s faces. Feliciano swears he saw one stranger become the devil before his eyes, and Sebastiano squeals. Grandpa says they are silly to think such things.

They never stay more than a night, and then they move on.

.

Antonio tells him not to worry, and then laughs in that silly way and ruffles his hair. Lovino punches him. They are only two years apart, and he hates it when Antonio treats him like a child.

“Just relax, Lovi.” Antonio tells him. “They won’t cause any harm.”

“Papa gets so angry when they’re around.” Lovino points out stiffly.

Antonio shrugs, and leans back against the tree trunk. The orange sunset dyes his brown curls to copper, his green eyes to amber, and his dark skin even darker. Lovino wonders if that’s why Papa never looks at him in the eye. Papa never likes anyone different.

Antonio cracks his knuckles one by one and adjusts his brace back over his shoulder. He smiles lazily at Lovino, and tells him not to worry again. Lovino scowls at first, but then he says he can’t help it, that Mamma worries so much and it wears off on him.

“Isn’t your Mamma worried though?” Lovino asks quickly.

Antonio stops smiling for just a second, but Lovino sees.

.

Emma is the one who tells him to be more careful when discussing such topics. Papa laughs at that, and tells her she has a mother’s heart.

Lovino smiles at her, and squeezes her hand as discreetly as he can. But Papa still sees, and teases Lovino about love and marriages and children until his cheeks and ears and neck are a deep pink.

Emma giggles behind her hand knowingly. He pouts at her, and she gently kisses his cheek. He gives her pink carnations as she leaves.

Papa hugs Lovino, and wishes him well. Mamma and Feliciano and Sebastiano immediately ask a thousand questions about her, and Lovino insists that nothing is happening, to which his mother is appalled that he would act so wantonly with her.

In the corner, Grandpa nods at him, and Lovino turns back to his mother to tell her just how pretty he thinks Emma is.

.

Grandpa says that they are running from something. When Lovino tells Antonio, he agrees. Lovino asks why.

“Sometimes it’s too dangerous for people to stay in their homes, so they leave.” He says, and he stares out across the river, his long fingers twisting around the stalks of grass. He pulls on one, two, three, and then begins to braid them together. The braid is messy.

Lovino wants to ask, but keeps his mouth shut.

Later, when they walk home, Lovino trips. Antonio tries to help him up but Lovino kicks him instead, and then wrestles him to the ground until they get up again. Antonio gives him a piggyback ride and they stumble into a ditch. Lovino laughs and Antonio laughs at Lovino laughing and Lovino laughs at Antonio laughing at him, and the world just seems so calm.

.

Emma takes his hand one day in town. “They aren't bad people.” She says gently, her green eyes wide. “They have nowhere to go.”

But it isn’t the refugees that set Lovino’s teeth on edge. It’s the villagers in uniforms.

.

Lovino turns eighteen, and the refugees do not stop. They stay for even less time each week.

One day, there are shouts from outside. Lovino was in the cool house for just a moment before chasing back into the sweltering heat. He sees Papa screaming so violently that Grandpa has to hold him back. He sees a family, ragged and shivering, cowering away from him. Lovino does not see Antonio until he turns to go back into the house.

The shadows across his face sink deep into his eyes, and his jaw is set so rigidly. There is no smile on his face. He doesn’t even look like Antonio, like the silly, joking, upbeat farmhand Lovino had known for such a long time. His eyes look dark, blank, dead. They seem to have watched centuries pass and empires fall and people die over and over again, and Lovino doesn’t understand why.

So he guides him into the house, watching as Papa fires more abuse the refugees’ way. Lovino takes him into the garden, and they sit quietly for a while.

.

Mamma is crying when he gets back from the river one day. For one long minute, he feels so exposed.

Papa begins talking about things like conscription and segregation and youth and Lovino is confused. He smiles at Mamma and asks her why she is so upset.

When she tells him, he goes and sits by the river for a while.

.

There is to be a war, Papa says. A war so great that it will make the earth tremble to its very core. A war so immense that everyone, from soldiers to sailors to civilians, will be dragged into it whether they like it or not.

Papa says he has to join the army, has to fight for his country. Grandpa stands between them and tells Papa no.

Lovino shakes, and he needs to see Emma. He tells Papa this, and Papa lets him run to her. By the time he reaches her house, he is soaked to the bone.

First his mother cries, then the sky cries, then his love cries. He feels pulled in two.

“I still have a while yet.” Lovino whispers to her and kisses her cheek.

“How long?” She asks.

Lovino can’t answer. In the corner, Antonio sighs and looks away.

.

It is two months later that war is declared. It is three weeks after that when Lovino is given a uniform.

“You’re actually doing this, then?” Antonio asks, incredulous, drumming his fingers against Emma’s crumbling wall. His mouth is smiling, but his eyes are feral and fuming. Lovino wants to hide himself away, but instead he scowls and yanks his shirt off, shoving it into Antonio’s hands. He has to make sure that his uniform fits.

Antonio stares at the shirt for a few seconds. He sighs.

“Look, Lovi, you know that I hate war, and…”

“What, you a coward or something?” Lovino jeers.

Antonio rubs his lips together. He is holding himself together by a thread, Lovino knows.

Lovino wants to break him.

“What the fuck are you staring at?” Lovino says. “I’m going to help save this country. I’m going to make it great again while you wait at home. Coward.”

Antonio’s fingers around his wrists are like shackles, and Lovino almost cries out in pain. Their noses are almost touching, and Antonio’s eyes are blazing like twin infernos. “You will murder and enslave and ruin.” He snarls, baring his teeth. “You will never bring greatness serving tyrants. You will only bring destruction.”

Adrenaline is making Lovino dizzy, and the fire is burning too much. He kicks Antonio and punches him, but Antonio does not budge.

“I hate you.” Lovino says.

“I hate you too.” Antonio replies, and for some reason that hurts so much more than it should.

.

Mamma is fussing with his collar, and he really wishes she wouldn’t. But it helps her stay calm and stops her crying, so he really can’t stop her. He prays that luck will find him in this moment of need, but he has not had much luck lately, and he isn’t sure that he deserves it anyway.

Feliciano is bawling. Sebastiano is close to tears. Grandpa is solemn and has his arm around Emma’s shoulder.

Only Papa looks happy. He is close to bursting, clicking his heels and smiling so much it seems as though his face will crack. “My boy.” He says, kissing Lovino proudly on both cheeks. “I am so very proud of you. You will do this country a great service, I am sure.”

Lovino kisses Feliciano and Sebastiano, and hugs Grandpa tightly. Emma leans her head against his shoulder and her eyes flutter close. “Come back,” She begs quietly. “Come back.”  
He promises he will, and presses his lips to her damp cheeks in farewell.

Mamma has to bite her lip when he kisses her forehead. She cups his face in her hand, and gently does the same to him. “I love you, my darling.” She murmurs.

When he is sitting on the train, surrounded by other silent men, he sees as she ducks her head behind Grandpa. He sees as Emma kisses her fingertips. He sees as Feliciano clings to Papa and as Sebastiano runs down the platform as the train leaves.

.

He doesn’t know where he is.

North? Somewhere north. Somewhere further than he has ever been before, and he refuses to admit that it frightens him.

He stays back from the gaggles of people, chewing on his lips and scowling. It sends people away. Sometimes that is a good thing, others not so much.

They are taken from camp to camp, and he travels the world in ways he has never wanted to. Always in the same stiff, starchy uniform, eating the same dull food, only in different weather. Everywhere is colder than home.

One day, he meets someone who is as alone as he. When people talk to them, they are jeered at. If they weren’t in the army, he wouldn’t be sure if they were a man or a woman. They laugh and say that they are neither. Lovino goes to step back and walk away, but he knows how closed-minded the world is, and rethinks.

“I’m Feliks.” They say, and they smile in that familiar way on an unfamiliar face

Lovino’s stomach twists, but he smirks too and takes Feliks’ hand to shake it. “Lovino.”

.

After Feliks comes Lukas. Neither say much to the other, but somehow, Lovino trusts him.

Lovino does not trust Sadık nearly as much, but he and Feliks fill the silences, and he lifts the mood, no matter how brazen he is. Their lone group of four stick together.

.

Their training is complete, and though so long has passed, it feels too soon before the battles begin.

They are so loud.

Each blast racks through him. He has never heard such loudness before. It trembles right through to the bone, pounding the earth above again and again and again and Lovino just wants it to stop.

He reads letters during the day, but they have no candlelight at night. It doesn’t matter. All the boys cling to each other, waiting for the next hit.

Each one is louder than the last. Each one makes them wish they do not exist.

No comfort is found in speech. The generals and captains and whoever else aim their guns at them if they make a noise.

One boy, Private Galante, is sent over the top. He comes back a raving mess, cowering and screaming at the slightest noise, begging to be set free and to visit his home so he could feel safe. He grabs Lovino’s hand and asks him to run with him. They shoot him for cowardice.

When it rings out, Lovino closes his eyes, and can feel the last kiss against his lips. It is all he can do to stop himself screaming.

.

Sadık grows quiet when speaking of home.

“I don’t think of home as a place.” He eventually says. “I think of it as a person.”

Lovino sneers at him for that. Feliks babbles on about their grandmother’s farmhouse, Lukas mutters something about log fires and trolls.

Lovino thinks of home. He likes Sadık’s description.

.

He doesn’t want to go over the top.

Feliks ignores his protests and squeezes his hand, and Sadık squeezes his shoulder, and Lukas nods at him while clutching at his gun.

Sadık snorts and says, “Make sure you come back, kid. You don’t want to die in the cold,” because he knows just how unforgiving these temperatures are. Feliks and Lukas roll their eyes at that, and Feliks makes comments about how they don’t know cold unless they’ve been to where Lukas lives. Lukas says nothing.

Lovino feels sick as he hears the blasts above him. But behind them, the captains have their guns cocked on their own men.

They all clutch their guns tighter, and walk straight into hell.

.

They are moved two miles south.

They leave Feliks behind.

.

It was so loud. So. Loud.

Too loud.

Can’t. Hurts too much.

Too many sounds. Too much. Too much.

But he had to. Had to find. Find. Find what? Lukas? Hurts. Find hurt?

Breathe. Must breathe. Keep breathe. Ing? Breathing.

Noise. Oh God, there was the noise, oh, God, oh, God, oh, God o

h g o d w h e r e i s h e ?

who is that ahead? many people. large group. metal tasting, and so tired. maybe Help? maybe Help?

oh. not help.

gun is gone. so is he.

.


	2. Chapter 2

.

It hurts so much when he wakes up. So, so much.

Too much. He wants to sleep again so he can forget this, so he can forget where he is and forget the loud noises, and forget how his leg hurts so very very much.

There is the clang of metal on metal and he can’t think. He can’t focus.

He opens his eyes and screams.

.

They talk about him in low voices in languages he doesn’t know. One is so close to his own but so different, and the words slur together anyway. He tries to tell them that he knows nothing, and they seem to believe him, but they won’t loosen the shackles. They don’t touch him otherwise.

When they speak to him, he only babbles. It seems as though all words escape him completely whenever he opens his mouth, and all he can do is scream.

Water tastes so good though, even though it hurts to open his mouth. His skin is either damp with red or tight and cracked, and he sleeps most of his days away.

Until there is a noise.

.

“… not a threat… just a kid…”

“… enemy…”

“… no, no, no… kid… innocent… trust me… I know…”

Black.

.

He wakes up in a bed.

There is a blanket over him of some thin, scratchy material, but it is a blanket all the same. He groans. His body feels so heavy, as though his bones are lead. Perhaps they are. He had heard of the enemy doing such things to their prisoners.

Someone else is in the room. Lovino can hear them breathing gently. There are tiny, tiny taps on the floor. They still feel too loud.

Lovino wants to shout, but his throat is too sore. His hands grasp at nothing. He tries to kick his legs out. Only one moves.

The person hushes him, and moves to the bed. But Lovino cannot see who it is. The light from the window above him is too bright, to white. They are big. Lovino tries to fight.

But the person does not hit him or punch him or inject him. The person presses their lips to his forehead and mutters something, and Lovino is gone once more.

.

He dreams of open fields and laughter, of dinner with his family and chatting with Emma, of sitting by the river with Antonio.

But it is winter now so the fields will be bare, and his family is so far away, and Emma’s letters will not reach him here.

And Antonio hates him. Of course he does.

The noises start again.

He wakes, his eyes damp, his throat raw. He realises then that he has been washed.

No one is in the room.

.

There is someone singing to him. Singing so sweetly. It is a woman, he realises. Women are not cruel. Women are kind and homely and motherly and

Some of those who first took him were women.

He recoils. The woman keeps singing. She is holding his hand.

He knows that voice. He doesn’t know where or why he does, but he knows that voice. Perhaps it is from one of his captors, but he isn’t so sure. There is the gentle swirling and patter of water, and a cloth is laid against his head.

“No fever.” He croaks. He is sure he doesn’t have one.

“It is low,” The voice replies, all silver and gold, “but it is there. You must rest.”

He knows that voice. It is like a breeze on a summer’s day, or silence. It is everything to him, has been everything to him for so, so long. “Emma?” He asks. He can barely stand to hope.

There is a small laugh. It is.

“Oh, my Vino.” She sings. It is sadder this time. “You have been through the wars.”

And he as he tangles his fingers in hers, he cries, because he has missed her so and yet he wishes she were someone else.

.

Emma knows them, he realises. Or at least knows someone who knows them.

They are courteous to her and avoid looking at him. He isn’t sure why. They haven’t tried to get any information out of him, and he is loath to admit that it scares him. Why did they take him?

Emma doesn’t say why. She only coos over his injuries and ruffles her feathers whenever someone who isn’t her comes near him.

He tells her of his leg. She frowns, and looks at it herself. They don’t discuss it after that.

How is home? He asks her. How are Mamma, and Grandpa, and the boys? She smiles vaguely and says they are fine. He wants to know more, but she only talks of how long it has been since she saw him last.

He is a man now, she points out. “A fine young man, too.” She says thickly, and then leaves his bedside for a few minutes.

.

He quickly grows sick of the same four walls.

He isn’t sure if he’s been here days or weeks or months, but he hates the wooden floors and the yellowed paint, he hates the creaking bed and its thin mattress, and he hates hates hates the single rickety chair in the corner.

He hates it when it is full, as he knows Emma will merely coo and avoid questions. But he also hates it when it is empty, as the only one around will be his thoughts. They get too loud. Even his shakes don’t stop them.

He can sit up by himself now, though. He views that as a small victory. Some of his lesser injuries have healed, and the pain in his larger wounds do not bother him so much. He still can’t move his leg.

.

The days are getting longer than the nights when Emma announces that he will return home.

He stares at her. “I can’t move my leg.” He says blankly. Blank is all he can be right now.

“I know.” She says, and she pauses for a minute. “But we have a chair for you, for now. My cousin had a man specially make it for you, and-!”

“I don’t want it.” Lovino can’t want it.

She looks at him, long and hard. “But Vino, you need to be able to move around, and-!”

“I am no cripple.” He growls, his hands balling into fists. He would not be seen as weak in front of those who took him and imprisoned him, and then freed him purely to suit the demands of a girl they had a tenuous link with.

“Vino.” He tightens his fists and lowers his head. “Vino, you are too weak to hold yourself up on crutches. We have no doctor here, or for miles. We have no professional to tell us exactly what is happening. But it has been months. And if you have no feeling at all…” She trails off miserably.

“I have feeling.” He grinds his teeth together and clenches his eyes shut, praying praying praying that his leg is only numb. “I just can’t move it.”

Her hand is soft on his shoulder. She makes no attempt to come closer. “But Vino, this is the only way to get you out of this room. The only other way is for you to be carried...”

“No.” The word is quick to pass his lips.

“You see? Your pride would not let you.” She takes his chin in her hand, and drags it around so he is looking right at her. “Your pride has been your downfall for so long, Lovino. It has stolen your happiness more times than you or I care to think.”

“Stop.” He whispers. Not here. Not now.

She shakes her head. Her blonde waves glint in the pale light. “Just swallow it for once and take the chair. You must get home, one way or the other.”

He fiddles with his hands, but, as ever, he knows she is right. There is no way to argue his case.

.

They catch a train to see a doctor. It becomes too loud.

The doctor's news is not good either. Lovino wants to sleep.

.

The train home is long and silent. His chair is uncomfortable and difficult to steer, but Emma does a sterling job and manages to get him on the train with very little fuss. Almost everyone around him is quiet. They often stare at their shoes instead of looking him in the face. He hates them.

Emma harrumphs loudly. “Ah, yes, of course. You are unsure where to look because you are faced with a man in a wheelchair and a woman, and neither are worthy of your eye contact.”

The conductor is aghast, and for a moment Lovino thinks that they will be thrown from the train, but he shuffles on without even clipping their tickets.

“Have you told my family of my condition?” He asks, staring out of the window. It has been so long.

Emma is quiet for a moment, but her answer is what he was looking for. “Yes. Your mother was upset, but she understood why. I gather that your father viewed it as a badge of honour.” Lovino snorts at that. Of course he would.

“Who is winning?” He asks. Trees fly by. Grass, bright green and glowing in the spring light, sends his stomach in knots.

Emma swallows loudly. “They are. The opposition.”

“Who is the opposition?” Lovino knows that Emma does not fight for the same side he did. What he does not know is what she means.

“Your opposition. Who else would they be?”

Lovino shrugs. “I am your enemy.” He does not stop looking out of the window.

“What do you mean?” Emma seems genuinely confused.

Lovino frowns. “You fight with the resistance movement. The ones who captured me.”

She gasps, and laughs. He taps his fingers impatiently. “Oh, my love, I do not fight for them, or with them, or anything else. I do not fight. I am neutral. I came after they had started to care for you.”

He blinks, and turns to her at last. He is confused. “But... your cousin... and why else would they let me go? Who changed their minds? Who looked after me?”

He thinks he knows, but he dares not hope.

Emma smiles, and says nothing.

.

Mamma cries.

She fusses over his chair and his scars and his leg and insists that they go to the doctor to check it over, but before she reaches the front door, she cries. Emma manages to wheel him across the flagstones with great difficulty, and wraps his arms around his mother. “Mamma, I am home,” He says, “and that is enough for me.”

And his brothers hug her too, and even though part of him is missing and he may have lost one leg, he truly means it.

.

The war ends four months later. It has caused so much devastation.

The fields around their village are patchwork. Papa was right, it turned out. The war dragged citizens into it as well. They were bombs that were dropped from the sky, and when Lovino asks about it, Mamma cries even more.

Money is tight. People are struggling to buy bread.

He grows stronger every day, though, and he uses his crutches as often as he can. The doctor said something about severed nerves and damaged tissue, and so he would never use his leg again. The doctor recommended an amputation, as it would only get in the way. Lovino agreed, but insisted he needed time to mull things over. 

He still stands by that, though he is warming up to the idea more and more as his leg becomes more and more cumbersome.

Feliciano and Sebastiano help him at every chance they have, though Feliciano is better. Papa talks less of when Lovino will work with him on the farm, but insists that he can find a job in town. He claims that Lovino will, no doubt, get a good job to support the family he will have with Emma.

Grandpa only smiles sadly at him, and looks away.

.

It is September of the following year when it happens.

Lovino’s leg has been gone since the year before. Though he is still recovering, it makes movement so much easier, and he finds he can move with his crutches almost as quickly as Feliciano’s slow walk. Emma says she is taking him to somewhere special, and he jokes that he hopes it includes food. She hits him, and he winks, and then she drags him out of the door before Papa can make one of his comments.

He begins to realise that she is taking him to the station. “Are we going somewhere out of town?” He asks warily. He doesn’t particularly enjoy travel. The loud clanking noises of trains sometimes echo in his mind, and sometimes he panics.

He has nightmares about the noises still, and they make him hot and cold, but Emma is holding his hand. “It will be okay.” She insists firmly. He believes her.

The clanking of engines sets his teeth on edge, and the smoke makes him uneasy. He begins to head towards the platform, but Emma grabs his shirt and pulls him back. “Wait.” She instructs.

He is confused, but he obliges.

He drums his fingertips against the wood of his crutch when the train comes in. He hates the way it chugs so heavily, but he knows that if he keeps his mind occupied, he will not panic. He feels the knobs and the dents in his crutch, counting them slowly, closing his eyes to truly focus on it as much as he could.

“Lovino, look!”

The smell is foul, and he furrows his brow just a little, but he is in control. He is strong. He can do this.

“Vino, come on!”

The sound of people is happy. People are excited to visit different places. People are excited to see family members, friends, see people they haven’t seen for a while, like…

“Lovino.”

Lovino opens his eyes. He can’t breathe.

Antonio is standing in front of him. His face is older, more tired. His shoulders stoop just slightly. He has scars on his arms, on his neck and his face, and Lovino just wants to touch them to take away the hurt.

But his eyes are different. His eyes are glowing.

And that goofy, toothy smile stretches across his face and it was as though half a decade had been taken from him, as though there had never been a war. And Lovino can think of nothing but him.

He doesn’t think. He just flings his arms around Antonio’s neck and buries his face into those dark, dark curls. Antonio still smells the same. Antonio still feels the same. Lovino’s eyes sting and his vision swims and suddenly he is sobbing into Antonio’s shoulder because Antonio is here. After so long. After so many years. He is here. In Lovino’s arms.

Oh, how Lovino loves him.

.

Antonio is missing fingers. His scars are numerous, some wide and some thin and all deep. He doesn’t say why he wasn’t here when Lovino came home. They sit together on the bed, Lovino leaning into him, his eyes fluttering close.

For the first time in so many years, he feels peaceful. He threads their fingers together as they often would so long ago, and sighs deeply to himself.

Antonio shifts lightly, and he feels a soft kiss to his lips.

Lovino’s fingers curl into his empty trouser leg, and he confesses, “The scars are ugly, but it was uglier before. You wouldn’t have wanted to see them.”

But Antonio just pushes a lock of hair behind Lovino’s ear, and says, “I already have,” and suddenly Lovino understands. Lovino understands, and Antonio has saved him in more ways than one.

.

 

“They should live with me.” Emma says to Mamma and Papa and Grandpa and the boys. “They calm each other.”

When Lovino wakes up crying, so does Mamma. Papa gets frustrated at her, which makes them both cry more. He shakes all night and when he hears the noises and sometimes for no reason at all. Feliciano hovers, Sebastiano stays away, Grandpa treats him like glass, but Antonio knows. Antonio helps.

But he is not the only one.

Emma helps in her own way, clearing spaces in her own home. She is the true hero.

.

Emma’s cottage is split into two. They live in the right hand side, the one that has the back garden rather than the front. Emma insists. She says it gives them more privacy to be themselves.

It feels so refreshing.

Antonio tells him of how he and his mother and sister had lived in this very same cottage for years after they fled their country. He says he was scared for Lovino and wanted to help him, but he couldn’t go against his own people.

Lovino understands, and they hold each other for a moment. They are in the garden. It’s light.

Lovino can’t quite believe this is happening, and Antonio laughs at him. It’s wild and joyful and so full of hope, hope that Lovino once would not dare to dream of, but it’s there and Lovino drinks it up as though he is starving. He supposes he is. 

They do everything hand-in-hand. It makes walking difficult, but Lovino’s crutch is discarded for Antonio’s shoulder, and suddenly everything is okay again.

.

They both get nightmares. Both wake up in a cold sweat.

They are of different things. Lovino’s are of booming and bullets and blood. Antonio won’t say what his are.

But they have each other. And though it is difficult, though sometimes they cannot breathe and are stuck in those nightmares even when they are awake and are clawing and screaming at ghosts, they have each other to hold. They always will.

And Emma will be damned if she sees them in pain. Lovino loves her for that.

.

 

The refugees begin to stop. Grandpa says it’s because their cities are being rebuilt. Sometimes, when a lone straggler wanders into their village, Grandpa takes them over to Lovino’s and Antonio’s for dinner.

Grandpa has always known, and so they don’t have to hide. That makes life easier. Feliciano is happy for them too, as is Sebastiano. Mamma and Papa do not know. Lovino doubts they ever will.

Emma watches over them as she always has, but they are not her only concern now. She takes in the few refugees who are still journeying back home, from lost academics with bushy eyebrows to the long-lost wife of an aristocrat. She talks about her a lot. She is happy in herself, and Lovino is happy for her.

The riverside is calm on an evening. Antonio’s dark hair looks like copper, and his green eyes look like amber. He and Antonio sit together, and talk about nothingness. Antonio tells him of people called Gilbert and Francis and Mathias, and Lovino tells him of Feliks and Lukas and Sadık. Lovino braids the grass now. Antonio watches, smiling.

The walk home is long for someone with only one leg. Antonio offers him a piggyback ride. They swerve and stumble, but they don’t fall this time. But still, Lovino laughs, and Antonio laughs at Lovino laughing, and Lovino laughs at Antonio laughing at him, and the world is calm.

.

**Author's Note:**

> the war in this fic is entirely made up, but it is based on aspects of both World Wars
> 
> idek where this came from. I think it came about because I miss besame mucho so much


End file.
